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Talk:Barney Hiller
Name Change This may seem strange to bring up at this late date, but: why are we going with The Bionic Criminal for guidance on the name? Does Universal get to do that, retcon successfully? His being Barney Miller in The Seven Million Dollar Man doesn't have equal weight? It would seem if the wiki was going to pick a side it would be the "senior" side.--Major Sloan 23:45, October 23, 2009 (UTC) :I think you're being facetious here, but just in case you're not (and for the benefit of newbies): for something like an inexplicable name change of an established character, the only logical thing to do is stick to the timeline. If we could just pick and choose which retcons to side with, that would be a howl, but we wouldn't be much of a reference. — Paul (talk) 09:54, October 26, 2009 (UTC) ::Not facetious at all, I genuinely want to know. So, by "the timeline" you mean that The Bionic Criminal was later? So they changed it, and this is what it is now. I guess my perspective was that if he was Barney Miller, and they changed it to get out of Hal Linden's way, then they blinked and I didn't. I was prepared to co-exist with the cop show, and Universal/Silverton chickened out. He'll always be Barney Miller to me, and it irks me every time I see Hiller. Seven was a better episode than Criminal anyway. That roll down the ramp was ridiculous.--Major Sloan 18:41, October 26, 2009 (UTC) :::If you take a look at the recent history of the Dominion of Balinderry article, you can see how I responded to another name change controversy. In that case, I noted the change and looked it up myself, and added some information and a couple of links, and "ambiguated" the name in question, as a way of keeping the wiki above the fray. In Barney's case, aside from my pro Miller leanings, I do think the wiki should have top level disambiguation for this, beyond the redirect from Barney Miller. A similar problem exists for Dr. Dolenz. Choosing one or the other is partisan, and while for my own personal work I might call him Miller, for the wiki I wouldn't, I would use the name from the episode I was referencing, or if it was an overview type of thing I'd "ambiguate" it, e. g. Miller/Hiller. What think you?Major Sloan 02:02, January 27, 2010 (UTC) ::::Ha! I just watched OinB this past weekend. Good episode. It was a pleasant surprise to see your Dominion of Balindary article pop up at the same time. Okay, re: this thread...a disambig page, Joe? Really? Sounds like a Slippery Slope™ to me. What about Jaime/Jamie? Or the narrative dialogue that teases Wine, Women and War? Or any of the other dozen or so continuity anomalies? Are they all too good for the Deconstructed header? Huh? Bucko? ;) — Paul (talk) 11:01, January 27, 2010 (UTC) :::::"Jamie" was a real contender early on, but by A Thing of the Past "Jaime" had been nailed down. That's 90 percent prevalence of usage, versus 50-50 here. Non- title controversies don't have the degree of problem. Dolenz is 33-33-33, with the original ambiguous, and the two others conflicting. Had I been building the wiki from the ground up, I would have deferred to the first, since unlike the others, it conflicts with nothing. By then the policy regarding non-use of titles and rank had doubtless prevented that, but it still makes sense that Dolenz be Doctor, with the first name consigned to the conflict discussion. Barney here I was thinking of making the article title Miller/ Hiller or Miller (Hiller) or the reverse if you must. The Bionic Woman (episode) has an altered name to accommodate the conflict with the series name, that's the level of fix I would look at. Keep the usage specific where appropriate, via link-labels ultimately.--Major Sloan 06:40, January 29, 2010 (UTC) ::::::Believe me, I don't like Hiller any more than you do. You're right, they did "blink" first. But we shouldn't allow that knowledge to influence our approach to documentation. As an encyclopedia, yes, we have an obligation to address the retcon, absolutely (which the article does quite well in its Deconstructed section). The Bionic universe follows a linear narrative, and as such, Barney's name comes to rest at Hiller. Despite our personal feelings, so too should the title of his character article. Your percentage assessment of 50-50 makes a better case for me; with such evenly divided halves, the tie-breaker should be the linear narrative. And to that end, our current Redirect from Miller to Hiller serves us better than any disambiguation page could. — Paul (talk) 12:19, February 7, 2010 (UTC) Smith screenplay I debated whether to mention Barney's presence in Kevin Smith's screenplay, since of course it was never made. However, since the screenplay was circulated -- I bought my copy in a store that specialized in selling TV and movie scripts for actors and film students -- I think it's fair to mention it here. The existence of a script is confirmed by Kevin Smith in his Evening Harder lecture DVD but having not seen it I don't know if he goes into plot details or not. If an admin feels citing the screenplay might be problematic, feel free to remove the section. 23skidoo 03:53, 5 February 2008 (UTC) :This is great trivia. I remember skimming through that -- wasn't Jaime in it? Yeah, I remember that she was there from the beginning; she was his girlfriend; watched him crash and helped him through recovery, etc. I'd simply change the header to Trivia. — Paul (talk) 17:25, 5 February 2008 (UTC) ::Trivia works for me (you must excuse me but I've been conditioned by Wikipedia into believing trivia is evil; I forget there are wikis where it's actually OK! ;-) You are correct, Jaime makes a cameo appearance at the start. And if memory serves (I haven't read the script in about 8 years; it's buried in a box right now), Jaime was actually described as African-American, but I might be wrong. As for Austin, reading this I immediately thought of 1990s-era Ben Affleck (not unreasonable seeing as he was closely involved with a lot of Smith's projects). I also vaguely recall reading that Chris Rock -- another Smith alumnus -- was rumored to have been in the running to play a comedic SMDM. I can't help wondering if this script was what they were thinking of, although I didn't really find it to be a comedy, though obviously this is Kevin Smith we're talking about so it's never dead serious. I think a separate article on the script is probably justified, especially since there is now a strong secondary source (Evening Harder) referring to it. 23skidoo 20:33, 5 February 2008 (UTC) :::Trivia, evil? Say it ain't so! LoL! But you're right, Alex, trivia doesn't have much of a place on Wikipedia. But that's just one of the things that separates us. Wikipedia and Wikia share three basic elements: they both were co-founded by Jimmy Wales, they both run on the WikiMedia engine, and they both strive for integrity in accuracy. So then what's the biggest difference? Community. Wikipedia is a database for EVERYTHING. We're a database for one thing. If a thousand people stopped editing articles on Wikipedia tomorrow -- who would notice? But here?--we'd notice if one person stopped. Discussion, collaboration, interaction -- that's how we're going to be successful. One-Edit-Wonders and Anonymity won't work here as it does in Wikipedia; it won't work in a community. :::Wow. LoL! /rant. :::Yes, trivia has its place in an entertainment wiki, no doubt about it. And I agree, the Smith script warrants an article. See if you can find your copy for some quotes! — Paul (talk) 16:24, 7 February 2008 (UTC) No bionic man for OSI for awhile? So, what did Oscar do from the time Steve and Jaime retired and before Mike Austin became an OSI agent? My guess is that he had Barney Hiller checked up on. Hiller was unstable in his first appearance, and was more stable in the second, but wishing he could drive race cars again - he seemed to think being powered up would help his driving, but it didn't. At the end of his second appearance, he and his wife seemed to have found a new purpose for him. It is just possible that after a few more years, Hiller was ready to handle the full bionic power, and was activated as an agent, neatly without the recent public awareness of a disastrous accident. He could have been killed on a mission toward 1989, leaving Oscar with no active bionic agents, and particularly needing Steve to deal with Fortress. He also could have viewed Mike Austin as a suitable new agent and had no problem arguing for the surgery with the Secretary. (Which secretary would it be? Secretary of Defense?) Of course, the Utah boy would be entirely unsuitable as an agent. Full bionic power was apparently debilitating, but regulated low power, with rest periods each day, seemed to be the best solution for him. So, my vote is that Hiller became an OSI agent and successfully managed his powered up bionics the third time around, served well, and died in the line of duty by 1989. Whether such an idea would and could ever be canonized... GCapp1959 01:09, 28 October 2008 (UTC)